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Monday, August 2

at my house..... {cause and effect}

It's a daily challenge being a mumma to two kids (adorable as they are) when it comes to keeping them amused, stimulated, happy and matching games and toys to their developmental capabilities and also their interest. The weekend was pretty gloomy and I thought of an idea that would interest my son, but wondered if he would like it, but I was wrapped when we was so taken by it, he played for hours, and has asked to play again when he comes home from kinder....

so what is it I hear you say??

Something so simple, most of you will have these items in your kitchen....

What you will need...

- some clear drink bottles (remove the label by soaking in some hot water)
- another clear container with a larger opening
- food dye (yellow, blue and red) in primary colours.

Fill the three bottles with water and add 1-2 drops of food dye in each bottle so you have a red, yellow and blue water.

Then get your child to pour one colour in the larger container and mix with another colour and watch what happens. My son was so enthralled by the changes of colour....

So I've promised him we can play this game some more this afternoon!

(if you have smaller children, they too are excited by the changes of colour and you can always punch a hole in the lid of the water bottles to reduce the flow of the water if you think pouring will be an issue! )

12 comments:

Such a challenge - I hear you! Mine are having a tea party under the kitchen table, spilling stuff over the already filthy floor.

Similar to yours, we have tried blue water in a jar then putting in some yellow coloured cooking oil (canola?). When you shake it up the mixture joins together and becomes green and then when it settles it separates back to blue and yellow.

Yesterday the house was too quiet. This was because four large bottles of food dye were involved in the concoction of a (gruesome) potion in a discreet corner of the sunroom. I can definitively confirm the entertainment value in semi-permanently dyed fingers. Etcetera!

It's tough on a gloomy day to keep them amused, I hear you. We love to play the 'colour mix' game in the bath. It's provided loads of fun for years. There's probably some case against popping your kids in the bath with artificial food colouring, but I don't wanna hear it!!!

I just thought of another thing to do with food coloring. When the snow drops (a spring bulb in the shape of little white bells) come out you can pop them in colored water and the color comes up to the petals and changes their color.

Sometimes I think the activities love best are the simplest ones using things from around the house! I can remember loving an old kids arts and crafts book when I was 6 or 7 - just turning the pages and finding different things to try at home using old paper plates and scraps of ribbon etc. Didn't even need to be able to read, looking at the photos was enough!